Child of Shadow
by ShadowWeasel
Summary: I was out. Where? Nowhere. It's always nowhere. That's one of my favorite places to go nowadays. Nowhere brings peace. Nowhere brings numbness. Nowhere brings ignorance. He thinks because I have his blood, I'm not allowed to go. I'm not supposed to leave his shadow. He doesn't know that you actually have to be a father to have a daughter.
1. Chapter 1

_Once upon a time, I gave my daddy a drawring. It was the bestest drawring ever! Mommy helped me colur it and make it look nice for daddy. Daddy was happy. Daddy smiled realy big and showed his sharp tooths. Daddys sharp tooths dont scare me. I think they look nice and cool and awsome. Mommy says daddys sharp tooths come from not brushing his teeth evry nite. But I want sharp tooths like daddy. I wish I cud grow up and be just like daddy. Plus also, mommy and me made cookies after and we shared them and it was good and I drinked milk and wached Barney._

_THE END_

_by MaRIa rOSe_

...

"Really freakin' cute." I turned the paper over in my hands and stared blankly at the scribbles on the back. Red, black, and pink crayon stained the yellowing page. Drawings of daddy and mommy and me.

My fangs gnawed nervously on the cig in my mouth as I stared at my mother's doodle-eyes. Green and vibrant and fake. The smoke from the drug rolled and roiled into my own violet irises and made them water and burn. I needed another light.

I dug a hand into my jacket-pocket and brought the silvery box out of the darkness. Its metallic sheen brightened in the starlight that bounced off of Marble Pond's glossy surface. With a flick of my thumb, the lighter produced a short-lived explosion of amber and blue fire. Then it steadied and breathed like a living creature, balancing precariously atop its silver stage, dancing for my amusement.

It didn't take long to find the next Marlboro. Flick. Lit. Drag.

"Oh, God," I thought aloud, spewing plumes of toxic fog as I exhaled, "I can hear them bitchin' now."

**Where the hell have you been? **

It'd be the same answers again. They had to know that, right? Didn't they know the pattern by now? _I was out. _

**Where? **

_Nowhere. _

**Don't screw with me. You stink like smoke. **

You stink like piss and beer, daddy-dearest. _It's my friends. _

**I don't want you hanging around a bunch of goddamned junkies. **

"Like you give a damn," I hissed through another cloud of relief, blowing the streams of gray air through the indigo night. Watched the ashes drift into the crystalline water below. Saw it taint the purity with its filth. "Like you give a shit!"

I was pissed again. Screaming. Cursing. Kicking.

The willow tree I was leaning against quickly became an outlet for my rage. My fist met it once.

"You goddamned..."

Twice. Snapping bark. Bruising fingers.

"... worthless, drunk-ass..."

Thrice. Cracking wood. Maybe bone. Knuckles purple. Gloves red with blood.

"... piece of shit!"

I punched once more and felt the roots shiver and shift beneath the earth. My hand was a bloodied, mangled mess by the time I was done. Freakin' brilliant. How're you going to explain that one to dad, huh? Tell him you were out punching trees?

I sighed in defeat, hefting my backpack over my shoulder and choking the remains of my cigarette on the singed bark of the tree. Then I stomped the ash and sparks into the dirt for extra care.

With one final look at the paper I held in my hand, I swore silently and tucked the thing away. Safely in my back-pocket.

No.

I took the thing back out and retrieved my lighter. Ignited it once more.

Not safe enough.

For a good ten seconds, I stood and watched as the flames licked away at the page, painting it black and brown and melting the ink into molten shit. Sending memories to hell.

Then I turned and began the walk back home. With any luck, mom would be waiting up for me. Not dad.

Against my better judgement, I had myself another cig before I got there. Breathe in. Burn. Breathe out.

Hell. Hopefully neither of them would be up when I got back.

...

"Where the hell have you been?"

Oh, Christ. "I was out." I tossed my bag onto the floor beside the door, closing said door as I did so.

"Where?"

"Nowhere," I answered, refusing to meet his gaze. I locked my sights on the stairs and marched for my bedroom.

"Don't screw with me," he growled. His hand clamped down on my shoulder. I flinched at the contact. Fingers squeezing. Knuckles tensing. Heart pounding. "You stink like smoke."

My throat was dry. I prayed to God that the stench of the fag I just had was gone from my mouth. "It's my friends," I insisted, barely a whisper.

"I don't want you hanging out with a bunch of goddamned junkies," he demanded.

I could feel my ears reflexively pressing against my skull as he spoke, the color in my face draining, the tears in my eyes glistening. "Yeah," I breathed.

"Are we clear, young lady?" His palm was like an anchor around my shoulder. I felt frail and weak. Ready to shatter. Glass in his hands.

"Yes, sir." I swallowed hard.

His hand came off of my body. The relief washed over me like a waterfall of ice. Cold and welcome.

I ran for my room. My only sanctuary in that hell that he called normalcy-...

"Wait."

My heart fell into my stomach. My stomach into my feet. The fear returned. Terror. True and all-too real.

"Look at me."

I didn't. Not right away.

"I said... look at me."

Go to hell. You son of a bitch. Just go to hell and leave me alone.

"Look at me, goddamn it!"

I finally did. Reluctantly. Hands shivering. Knees quivering. Ribcage about to burst beneath the weight of my hammering heart.

The ultimate life form hadn't aged a bit in the sixteen years that I'd known him. According to mom and old photo albums, that is. His quills black as midnight, like mine. Blood-red highlights. Naturally occurring. Tuft of white fur like a phantom full of knives fixed to his chest. And those freakin' eyes. Like looking into portals to hell. Scarlet and flaring like twin pools of hellfire. Empty, dead pupils black as a void. The kind of eyes that stare at you and through you and inside of you all at the same time. The kind of eyes that made me afraid to go to sleep at night.

The kind of eyes that were looking at me then.


	2. Chapter 2

The hum of fluorescent lighting rang in my ears, echoing through my skull like a train rumbling through my brain. Sounds of sixteen-wheelers pulling off and onto the road grumbled outside, sending shudders through my body and shaking the windows of the building. My good eye scanned the rows of snacks nonchalantly, and I walked with my hands in my pockets. Waiting. Pretending to not be addicted. Faking not going through withdrawal.

Then when I saw the smokes, I lunged hungrily at the rack. Hell yeah; they still had a few Marlboros left. My favorite.

I tried my best to not full-on sprint to the register when I picked out two packs and fished the appropriate amount of bills from my wallet. A bleach-white hedgehog was waiting for me, his quills long and greasy and down in front of his eyes like hair. His nametag pronounced his name as 'Jared,' but I knew better.

"Hey, _Jarhead_," I greeted with a small smile as I placed the cigs on the counter.

His ice-colored eyes flickered as he snapped out of his daydream and back to reality. "Oh. Hey, Ria."

I let out a tiny sigh of relief as he moved to ring me up and feed my habit. Jared had been my friend for as long as I could remember, and my fence for cigs for the past couple of years. I thanked God he wasn't too involved with conversing this time around.

That was until he looked at me. "Jesus," he gasped sharply, fully alert now. "What the hell happened?"

I felt my cheeks burn amber. The eye dad had picked the night before swelled with pain. But I forced a chuckle. Told a lie. "You should see the other guy."

Jared gave me a stern look.

**What the hell did you do to your hand? **

"Look, I fell," I insisted. "Get off my back."

He huffed and shook his head. His tired, stoner-eyes flared with cold fire like the ends of dying fags. "Like hell you did."

_I didn't _do _anything to it. _

**Then why the hell is it such a goddamned mess? **

"Piss-off and ring me up," I snarled.

"Yeah, yeah," Jared grumbled. He moved back and away from the counter for a moment, turning and taking the smokes with him. "Hold on. I gotta' get something."

"Okay." I stared down at the filthy porcelain flooring of the gas station store. "Hurry up."

**Are you going to tell me what you did to your hand, or do I have to ground you? **

_Ground me? _I winced in agony as a stinging sensation shot through my eye. _Ground me? _

I shouldn't have laughed.

"Alright," the white hedgehog spoke, yanking me out of the hellfire and back to purgatory. "Here you go."

I blinked at him when he handed me a plastic grocery bag full of the Marlboros I'd picked as well as a can of beer. Perspiration and bits of ice dripped from its tinny shell.

"You know I don't drink, Jarhead," I told him, taking the bag and ignoring the alcohol.

"Shut up and hold still," he commanded, suddenly standing up on his tiptoes and leaning over the countertop. His tall, lanky body easily cleared the obstacle, and his arm reached out with the Bud and pressed it to the black-blue spot where my eyeball usually was. Gently. Kindly.

I felt my face go pink at the contact. But I could pass it off as being cold, so I didn't worry about being seen blushing. "Thanks," I managed, barely above a whisper.

"Keep that cold," he ordered, disregarding my gratitude. Because that's what friends do. "You don't want that shit getting any bigger."

"Yeah." I nodded and took the beer. Pressed it to my eye until it was numb. "Yeah. Gotcha."

...

_Darkness_

I tapped my pen against the paper, causing a flapping noise to erupt from the loose page. What the hell rhymes with darkness? Poetry had been my escape from life for as long as I could recall, but even then it was a pain in the ass to have to think up words that rhymed with what you were already thinking. I know you can free-verse, but... God, it just doesn't look right.

_artist harmless harshness_

I frowned. None of those really fit. I chewed anxiously on my pen, longing for a smoke but knowing it would have been damned stupid to have one in the house. My room might have been upstairs, and there might have been a window next to my bed, but there was no way in hell I was risking a drag right next door to my parent's room.

_carcass _

Hey. That one might work. I scribbled it down.

_Lying in my darkness _

_Cold and rotting carcass_

I leaned back into my purple pillow, and the mattress shifted just enough to send the can of beer next to me tumbling into my knee. With a sigh, I picked it up and turned it over in my hand. What the hell did he see in these things? Did they taste good? Based on the way they stunk...

_Disgusting-smelling starkness_

**Daddy doesn't mean to do it, sweetheart.**

_Mother says it's harmless_

**He's just going through a rough patch, that's all. **

_We both hide from his harshness_

**It'll all be over soon, honey.**

My fingers were trembling. The ink stained and scrawled the paper as I shivered violently, fighting the tears. It was going to sting like hell with this black eye.

**Trust me.**

I wept quietly, slashing dark lines in the shape of letters across the page. Painted my heart in the form of black, cold blood. Then I crumpled it up and rocketed it away with a balled-up fist, throwing it as far into my closet as I could throw. Then I sobbed for a good ten minutes, my eye burning with every drop that fell.

_BUT IT'S ALL JUST FUCKING POINTLESS_


	3. Chapter 3

"How was school today?"

Played hooky. "Fine."

"Learn anything new?"

Cigarettes are up to six bucks a pack. That sure is something, isn't it, mom? "No."

"Well, you had to have learned something..."

Changed the subject. "Where's dad?"

My mother froze, and hellish silence rang through the house. The fading, weak lightbulb that swung low above our kitchen table hummed quietly as the sound of hearts beating and noses breathing and crickets chirping played a strange symphony.

Her softened, lime-green eyes flickered, and I swore I saw the little pink hairs on the back of her neck stand on-end. You freaking coward. "Your father had to go out of town," she explained after a while. "He was called out on some sort of emergency."

I huffed. Picked at my potatoes like they were alive. Dinner at the Roses' house. "It's always an emergency," I complained uselessly, shoving a forkful of food into my mouth.

"Now," mom protested, glaring at me as sternly as her broken spirit would allow. "That is no way to talk about your father."

Oh, God. "Yeah."

"No, not 'yeah.' Maria, I don't believe you understand the situation." Amy Rose sat up in her seat, put her silverware down, and tried to explain to me how much of a freaking saint dad was. Newsflash, mom. Angels fall, too.

"Mom, I get it," I insisted, looking away and pretending to be interested in the shape of my butter knife. The curves of the blade reflected the dying light of the ceiling-lamp perfectly, casting a garish orange-yellow ball of light onto the sharpened end. My purple eyes stared back at me in the metallic sheen. The blackened one puffed and swelled.

"I don't think you do, young lady," she was still talking. Still trying to force-feed me lies. "Your father is the provider for us, you know. If he didn't go to work every day like he does, where would be then?"

Don't make me answer.

"Maria, where would we be?"

Stop trying to convince me to love him.

"Look at me when I'm talking to you."

**Look at me. **

My heart was racing. Blood pounding in my skull. _Please._

"Maria? Are you even listening?"

**I said... look at me.**

My palms glistened with cold sweat. Fingers trembled uncontrollably. _Please just leave me alone._

"_Look _at me."

**Look at me, goddamn it!**

I snapped. In a moment of pure, unbridled fury, I stood violently from the table, knocking my chair over and probably breaking one of the legs as a wooden crack rang in my ears. The plate was in my hands without my even thinking about it. Aimed for her head. Some part of me told me she was my mother and made me miss. Hit the wall behind her. _Smash._

Shattering ceramic. Breaking drywall. Cragged, jagged bolts of black lightning spread like bleeding ink. World turned to shit.

She was on my ass almost immediately. "_Maria!_" she shrilled.

There were tears in my eyes. Weakness. Agony. _Why don't you see it? _"He's a bastard."

"Do not use that kind of language in this house!" she commanded.

Broken voice. Little girl. Damn puberty to hell. "He hates me." _He hates _us.

Her face warped from shock to wonder. "Your father does not hate you. He loves you very much-..."

"_Look_!" I screamed. Slammed my hands on the table. Sent forks and spoons tumbling to the floor. "_Look _at me!"

I jabbed my finger towards my face. Pointed at the eye he had chosen. "Is this love? Is it?" I cried, begging for an answer. "Freakin' bullshit!"

No thinking. Just yelling. Venting. Crying. I yanked my shirt over my head and threw it away, exposing my body to my mother. Bruises. Blue and black and purple. "Is this love?" I demanded, pointing to each one individually. "Or this? Maybe that one? How about that one?"

There was fear in her eyes. Terror amidst the sea of placid green. No reply.

"Answer me, damn it!" I stormed towards her and snatched her hand away. Forced her to feel the places where he hit me. _It hurts, mommy._

Tears trickled down her face. Silent.

"Answer me!" _Make it stop hurting._

Sobbing. Weeping like a child. Like a freakin' kid. _Mommies aren't supposed to cry._

"Goddamn it!" I cried with her. "Damn it, you can't cry. That's not how it works..." I buried my face in her shoulder. Felt her arms wrap around my topless form. Cold and alien. "... you're not the one that's supposed to cry. _I'm _supposed to... to..."

Hot tears like molten lava. Headache from hell. She shushed me, told me sweet and impossible lies. "It's alright. It's okay. Everything will be okay."

I bawled with her because I knew none of it was true. Just another giant lie.

...

The loud, clapping noise of sneakers smacking hardwood flooring echoed through the gymnasium like gunshots. Sitting in the corner, pretending I sprained my ankle, the rest of the class ran laps around and around and around like a bunch of freakin' idiots.

Bored out of my skull, I decided to play a little game I called 'Guess that Stereotype.' Five large hedgehogs and dogs barreled past me, sprinting their laps with the greatest of ease. Two of them laughed and joked, and the other three passed a basketball between themselves. _Jocks._

A few kids jogged along behind them, pushing their glasses up onto their noses and taking deep, sometimes uneven breaths through their mouths. _Geeks._

About six hedgehogs walked by me nonchalantly, gossiping and bragging about their latest exploits. What dress they just bought. Who was sucking whose dick. Whose dick they recently sucked. _Bitches._

The circus ringleader, a makeup-painted piece of plastic called Mackenzie, shot a look at me as she passed. Then she snickered and proceeded to spread rumors about me as she walked, and all of her little friends laughed with her. I smiled as they went, flashing my favorite finger behind their backs.

"Mari-... Maria?"

The sound of a thickly accented voice called me to look up, and I saw a black cat with lusciously smooth black fur and beautifully milk-white ears. Her indigo eyes watched me shyly. "May I... sit with you?"

I scooted to my right and made room. "Sure. And it's Ria."

Yolanda, the school's very first French exchange student, smiled at me with her perfect teeth and sat down beside me. "Thank you," she said in that accent any smart girl would die for. Or maybe I'm just jealous. "Ria."

I sighed and leaned my head back, resting it against the cool brick behind me. "God," I thought aloud, "I could really go for a smoke."

Yolanda looked at me curiously. "Smoke?" she questioned innocently.

"Nothing," I told her.

She nodded and stared off into the distance with me. It seems to be a common pastime that my friends and I share. Zoning-out and forgetting it all.

"Alright, class!" coach suddenly called from the other end of the gym. "We're headin' down to the weight-room. Let's go!"

I stood and stretched my legs, making sure to fake-limp as I went. Yolanda and I brought up the rear of the class, hanging back and away from the crowd.

Mackenzie saw us and beckoned to us mockingly, "Hey, come on you two, let's work out!" Then she turned to her friends when we didn't respond. "God knows they need it."

I groaned as we entered the room and was assaulted with the stench of sweat. "Jesus," I whispered to my friend as we wandered inside. "What a bitch."

Yolanda laughed even though I was fairly certain she didn't know what I meant. Little did I know that she was about to surprise me. Hell, she was about to scare the shit out of me is more like it.


	4. Chapter 4

Midnight-black limbs shaped like mangled fingers spanned out and pressed themselves flat against the blue-gray sky. Clouds rolled and sprawled and spat dank, silver colors at the horizon, painting a depressing and all-too surreal backdrop for the dying trees. Leaves fluttered and flickered scarlet atop the decaying, wooden fingernails. It reminded me of flecks of blood, spattered along the corpses of trees like flecks of fleeing red life struggling to escape blackened veins and arteries.

Looking Out the Window of a Shitty School Weight-Room, by Maria Rose. You're freakin' welcome.

After a long while of staring blankly at the web of lifelessness called autumn, I chanced a glance at reality. The indoor world shimmered with flashes of stewing crimson and gray, and for a second I was blinded by it all. Then the real world finally settled back in, and I sighed a cold breath of exhaustion.

"Something wrong?" Yolanda asked from somewhere far away.

I turned to her soft voice only to find her sitting beside me, next to the window and away from the prying eyes of our peers. "Oh," I said dumbly. "Uh, no. No, nothing's wrong."

"_Something wrong_?" somebody mocked from a distance in a fakeass French accent. I was unsurprised to find Mackenzie at the voice's core, and she giggled when she saw me staring.

"_D-doh, duh... nothin',_" one of her Barbie-doll slaves replied, teasing me without even looking in my direction. The three of them, Mackenzie included, snickered at us as they proceeded onto one of the benches.

I was tempted as hell to give them the finger while their backs were turned, but I wasn't sure where the coach was, so I didn't bother risking it. Instead I only sighed, "Bitch."

Yolanda chuckled quietly, eliciting a small smile from yours truly.

"If I..." she stumbled on the English as she remarked, "... if we had dollar for every time she was called that."

That one got me. Maybe it was the butchered English. Maybe I hadn't heard a good joke in a while. Either way, I burst out into snickering hysterics as I answered, "We would be freakin' rich!"

So there we were, Miss and Miss Misfit, laughing our asses off about something that wasn't even that funny, when all hell broke loose.

Mackenzie was a blonde hedgehog with strawberry-peach colored highlights in her beauty queen hair, a lanky, cheerleader figure, and sapphire-blue eyes that were on fire as they glared through us. She was marching towards us before either of us could get away in time. God, not again.

"What's so frickin' funny, Gothgirl?" she asked, looking at me as I stood to greet her. I flinched at the nickname.

"Nothing," I lied, crossing my arms over my ill-fitting tee.

"_Duh-doh, nothin'_," she retorted mockingly, prodding my chest with one of her painted claws. "It sure as hell sounded like something. Spit it out, Gothgirl."

"Piss off," I told her, my heart hammering against my ribcage. Coldsweat. Terror. _Don't confront me._

"What did you say to me?" she gaped, pretending to be offended. "Hey, look me in the eye, emo. What'd you say to me?"

_Leave me alone._ "Nothing. Just lay off already."

Push. My spine rattled against the windowsill. Acted like it was nothing. "What'd you say?"

_Leave me the hell alone. _"Please..."

Shove. Harder this time. My teeth shook. "Hey! Look at me!"

Laughing. Her friends behind her. The rest of the world blurring. Turning to shit. Demonspeak. Fangs. Smiling and laughing like hellfire. "Oh, damn. Look at that shiner."

Hands on my chin. For a better view. "Look at me, hey. Your dad give you that?"

There were tears. White-hot saltwater streaming down my face. "Does it hurt, baby? Daddy give you a boo-boo? Look at me, already. Come on!"

**LOOK AT ME.**

"She said you were bitch!" Somebody beside me. Black and white fur and blue eyes. Yolanda. "I think that, too!"

Million-mile an hour thoughts. Only a few surfaced. Thank God. Don't do it. What are you doing? Shut up. Help me. Stay out of it.

Yolanda stared defiantly into Mackenzie's porcelain eyes. Bullying is a universal language. She knew that tongue well enough, I guess.

So she should've seen it coming when the 'bitch' threw her fist straight into her nose. Blood spewed like amber flower petals, in gouts of spectacular color that contrasted the dingy gym palette. Yolanda sank to the cement floor like a rock, landing on her face with a nasty noise.

"_Never _talk to me like that," Mackenzie commanded the unconscious girl, "French-slut."

"Fuck you."

The weight-room fell into dead silence. The most popular girl in school turned to me, her head cocked sideways and her eyes narrowed. "What?"

I was staring at the floor. Don't say anything. Voices in my skull screamed and scraped at the bone.

She walked up to me until we were a hair's breadth away from one another. Her breath stunk of perfume and lip gloss and sex. It beat beer and piss by a mile. "What did you say to me, freak?"

The demons. Clawing and tearing away my insides. _SAYITAGAINSAYITAGAINSAYITAGAINSAYITAGAINSAYITAGAIN. _

Then everything went to hell as I swung my white-knuckled fist straight at her and yelled at the top of my lungs, "Fuck you!"

The impact was satisfying and loud and painful and delicious all in one, and I watched her topple over backwards and into the rack of dumbbells behind her. There was blood. On my hand. From her nose. That felt _so _freakin' good.

The red was streaming down her pretty little face like rain as she staggered upwards but failed to recover. She rested her trembling arms on the rack behind her as she sniffled bloodstuff and snot. "Y-..." she choked on blood. I must've hit her harder than I thought. "You bitch..."

I ignored her, trying my damnedest to fight the emotions struggling in my throat. Heart pounding in my chest. Yolanda was still even as I knelt to her side. "Hey, Yolanda," I beckoned, giving her a shake as I moved to help her off the filthy, sweat-slicked floor. "Come on. Let's get up."

Mackenzie stumbled to her feet in the background, and even though I was doing my best to pay attention to anything but her, I still heard those last, muttering words as she retreated.

"At least my dad loves me."


End file.
